Slate Debunks the Fox News Lawsuit Against Robin Carnahan

​From being represented by a law firm with ties to Republican Roy Blunt to using copyright law for the purpose of political censorship, earlier today Slate published a thorough take-down of Fox News and their "bogus" lawsuit against Robin Carnahan, Missouri's Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate.

(In case you missed Chad's post last week, the lawsuit stems from an interview Congressman Blunt gave to Fox News' Chris Wallace in 2006 in which the television reporter questioned Blunt about his ties to the tobacco lobby and his campaign committees gift to a firm linked to convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Carnahan is using excerpt from that interview in a television ad painting her G.O.P. rival as the "Very Worst of Washington.)

Fox, of course, claims that it is nonpartisan--"fair & balanced," the slogan goes. But this law suit looks like evidence of just the opposite. Even if Fox had a good copyright claim--and we're not convinced that it does--a prudent news organization would think very carefully before filing suit against a candidate in the heat of a campaign, lest it be perceived as using its intellectual property rights as leverage in the election. Fox News, however, seems to have had no such qualms. Maybe we shouldn't be surprised. This is, after all, the network owned by a corporation that recently made a $1 million donation to the Republican Governors' Association and a $10,000 donation to Blunt himself. The lawsuit is another kind of gift.